Guardians may have unlocked new version of Joey Cantillo after move to bullpen 

Last September, the Cleveland Guardians shifted to a six-man rotation to make room for Joey Cantillo. And Cantillo rewarded that decision with a strong month that helped him win American League Pitcher of the Month. 

This September has been a much different story. 

Although Cantillo started the month in the Guardians’ (five-man rotation), he allowed nine runs (four earned) in his first start of the season and didn’t make it out of the third inning in his second. Last September's version of Cantillo was nowhere to be found. 

That changed on Saturday when Cantillo pitched four solid innings with eight strikeouts in the Guardians’ loss to the Twins. That outing was also significant given it came out of the bullpen, marking Cantillo’s first relief outing of the season. 

The Guardians may not have committed to Cantillo working as a reliever for the final two weeks, but they could easily do so thanks to some schedule quirks the rest of the way and depth of their pitching staff. 

Joey Cantillo's bulk outing against the Twins showed his future could be in the bullpen

Cantillo’s move to a bulk reliever against the Twins stemmed from two big reasons. While those aforementioned struggles were one big reason, it also gave the Guardians a bit more flexibility as they reshuffled their pitching staff ahead of this week’s big series against the White Sox. 

This year marked Cantillo’s first season working exclusively as a starter after being a swingman option in his first two big league seasons, and it came with some mixed results.

He showed some flashes (named a strong three-start sequence at the end of June), but he also had plenty of truncated starts due to a lack of command. 

He still leads the American Leagues in walks allowed (78) despite only allowing one walk in Saturday’s outing. 

“It was concentrating on execution and throwing pitches down the middle,” Cantillo said after the start, per Cleveland.com’s Paul Hoynes. “It should always be that way, but over the last few weeks I’ve gotten away from the process that makes me really good.”

The Guardians’ decision to go with Cantillo as a bulk pitcher almost worked thanks to Daniel Espino’s scoreless two inning start combined with Cantillo’s bulk outing, but Franco Aleman blew it with a disastrous outing that resulted in him getting demoted in place of Connor Brogdon. 

The Guardians are only going to need a fifth starter once over the final two weeks of the season, so they could fully shift Cantillo to the bullpen should they choose. 

That move would give the Guardians a bullpen that has two players who combined to make 51 starts for them (Cantillo and Cecconi), but that’s life for a team in the middle of a postseason hunt. 

It may not be the way the Guardians imagined at the start of the season, but it’s the reality they’re in, and Cantillo passed the first test on Saturday. 

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